Peter is a walking boy! He took his first steps to me last week, on the 17th, but this week, he has walked away from me and figured out how to crawl to the table or chair, pull up, and walk away. He's loving it and Ella is too. Soon he'll be chasing after her. I can't believe how fast time is going by and how big he has gotten. His 12 month appointment had him at 24lbs and 27inches, in the 70th percentile for both. :) I'm still loving my chubby boy!

Our college friends, Brandon and Kate Weber, came with their son Braeden for 2 weeks also in May. It was fun having them here with us and the kids miss their playmate. They left a sippy cup here and Ella always calls it "Braeden's pup" and wants to use it every day. :) Thanks for coming to see us guys! 

The picture of Andrew and I was from a Doctor's party we went to, the first time we'd been out in a while by ourselves. Thanks for watching the kids, Kate and Brandon! 

The dark picture of Ella is taken on my phone and she is holding a basket of eggs! She gathered them herself at our friend's barn and had a good time! She had to hold the carton on the way home, then carry them in and put them in the "shiderator," talked about them all night, ate them the next morning and had to show our other friend the ones left in the "shiderator." I love how excited she gets about things. It makes me smile.

These are pictures from Memorial Day, we went to a friend's house for a picnic! We also got to make my all time favorite camping food, S'mores! Ella had fun, but was unsure of how to eat them :). I helped her, naturally! Peter had fun playing ball with Andrew and Ella liked trying badminton. In the picture of Peter and I, I am 16 weeks pregnant and definitely showing these days. 

More company and outings...

Last week we had a lot of fun having Courtney here from Oregon. Ella calls her "Corty" and still thinks if there are blankets on the couch that "Corty is seeping." And since we picked her up from the airport, she thinks every plane has "Corty on it." We went to Lewisburg one evening and had fun at the park. Here are some of the pictures from our time there.

New Things

Ella is learning her ABC's, animal noises, and numbers these days. It's pretty fun and entertaining. Peter took his first steps on Tuesday the 19th of May and that was very exciting. He's not completely walking, but he's getting wherever he wants, but some method or other. Scooting, crawling, or cruising along furniture. He even figured out how to climb up into a small chair. Times are getting busier with all this movement, but I'm excited for both of them to be mobile for summer. This may mean longer naps!

 

Mother's Day May 10, 2009

Today is Mother's Day and my kids decided to start it early around 6:40am. Ella is sleeping on our floor with her mattress "big bed" she calls it. Andrew is on-call and he was also awake then. She popped her head up and smiled at him and said, "Hi Daddy!" Then realized I was awake too and said, "Oh hi Mommy!" Meanwhile, Peter is down in his room crying, so Andrew went and got him. Lucky for Peter because had Ella not been awake, he would have had to get his little self back to sleep. The other thing is that we have company visiting, so letting him cry is harder. Anyway, Andrew got their milk and came back up where I was with the kids in my bed. They were already playing around and laughing and he looked at me and said, "Well, Happy Mother's Day!" I guess that was a pretty nice way to start my day, I only wish it had been about an hour later. So we went the the early service today. It starts at 8am. This is the contemporary service, the 10:45am one is traditional. And when I say traditional, I mean that the kids actually gave me a gift getting us all up early enough to get to the 8am service. It's nice to be reunited with instruments of the percussion persuasion. Don't get me wrong, I like hymns, but just not for every Sunday, every song. Church was good and after Ella asked for a doughnut, but they had other treats for the coffee time which we don't usually make it to that satisfied her little sugar tooth. We got home and I needed to get Peter down for his nap. I took him upstairs to his room. Lately, he has been cuddling with me a little before I lay him down (wouldn't trade this for anything). Usually I am wearing long sleeves, but it is warming up and I have short sleeves on today. Peter had his head on my shoulder and I felt something running down my arm. It was his drool! I started laughing, but he didn't move, he clung on to me with both hands, so I just let the drool run it's course :). He drools more than any kids I've ever known. His sheets have a wet spot by his mouth within seconds of me laying him down. It's funny. We all sleep with our mouths open, so I'm not surprised. Small sinus passages are to blame for this. Right now, Ella and I are sitting on the couch while she watches "choo choo trains," (Thomas and Friends). I have been trying to use Peter's nap time as a time for her and I to hang out, whether it's watching toons, or reading, baking, things like that, but today, she wanted Thomas, so that's the activity. It leaves me with the ability to write this. Even though every day I am thankful to be a mom, it's nice to have a day that honors it. It also reminds me of the days that we would do things for my mom, make her things at church and school, attempt to make breakfast for her in bed, and write cards and messages about how much we love and appreciate her. Since having my own kids, as they always say, I have come to appreciate my mom even more knowing now all the sacrifices that go into parenting. It's rewarding, but it's not always easy. So thanks mom, I love you. 

My little man is growing up and finding that bananas make a great hair paste! Ella thought this was pretty funny and kept saying, "Peter's hair's crazy, Peter's so sunny! (funny)." We were both laughing at him, hence, the expression on his face. I styled it like this, but he did his own pasty application :). 

He is also chubby as ever, and since it's been warm, I can enjoy looking at the rolls on his legs all day long! His "cankles" (calves that turn to ankles with no real definition) are awesome and I love the dimples in his hands. The fact that he's getting around more and trying to walk means that they will get smaller and he will thin out over the next year, so I had to take up close pictures of my still-very-doughy-boy. 

Back to finish up the visitor update, Cousin Levi and Aunt Renee came for Peter's birthday and my sister flew out here at the last minute to be with all of us as well for a week! We were able to do all kinds of things while they were here. Among them, playing out in the hot weather, watching the kids enjoy their time together, going to the Hershey Zoo and the Hershey Chocolate World, and walking around Lewisburg. Levi and Ella had fun watching the ducks in the little stream. One of the nights after dinner we all danced in the living room, this picture of Peter and I is him pumping his arms to the music. :) Here are some of the other pictures from their stay here too. 

Here are the first few pictures of all the cousins together during their visit. They got along really well, as well as you could expect toddlers to. Ella calls Levi, "Cousin Le-i." Peter loved having someone new to watch. I think he tried to learn how to eat from Levi, who feeds himself, but as you can see, letting Peter feed himself was nothing short of a disaster. He had apple sauce in his ears and hair in about 2 minutes. Oh well, we'll try again later, but for now, he can just keep watching and learning on things less messy. 

Peter turns 1!

April 24th was Peter's first birthday. It's hard to believe time has gone by so fast! He is crawling and walking along furniture and while holding hands. He loves being outside and is a typical boy when it comes to making messes and liking to get dirty. He is happy and smiles all the time. We also learned after the cupcake consumption that he is a huge fan of sweets. I mean, who isn't in this family, but I had no idea he was capable of eating a whole cupcake in under 5 minutes. He had fun opening presents, with Ella's help of course. Ella had been so excited about Peter's birthday and every time a package came in the mail, she said, "It's a present for Peter! Let's open it!" I would say, "No, Peter's birthday is next week, we have to wait." So when the day finally came, I said, "Ella, it's Peter's birthday!" And she said, "No, next week." Then I said, "Tonight is the birthday party and we can open some gifts when he wakes up from his nap." About 2 seconds later, she said, "Is Peter awake yet?" She was more excited than he was I think. I had fun making the cake, but learned my lesson about eating batter. It made me sick for about 3 days with some kind of food poison that I had to get medicine for since being pregnant made it worse.  The cooked stuff was just as good and from now on, I'll stick to that. Aunt Renee and Cousin Levi were here for Peter's birthday too, which was so nice. Well, Peter's 1, and going to be a big brother and the only thing he knows about babies is that he wants to poke them in the eyes. We'll be working on that over the next few months. Until then, he'll just be his chubby little eye-poking, hair pulling self, and I love him anyway.

On April 17th we embarked on our second family weekend get away. This time instead of the mountains (in October), we decided to take a train through Amish country in Strasburg, PA. We stayed in a hotel in Harrisburg, about an hour away from us, and an hour away from Strasburg, to split up the driving. The kids actually do well in the hotels, now that Ella has the ability to sleep in a bed and Peter still loves the pack and play. We told Ella we were going to see trains and she was excited all day long. The ride was about 45 minutes long and it was a nice weekend for it since the trees were flowering and the weather was good. I'm amazed at how the Amish live in the midst of the towns they are surrounded by, but glad they're close because I love their furniture, quilts, and food! Ella really liked being on the train, and since Peter didn't take a nap that morning until the last 15 minutes of the car ride, he got a little cranky by the end. We tried to get mexican food that night because pregnancy cravings kicked in and we ended up getting everything to-go when the food came. The kids had enough for one day and we were not willing to deal with it in public. They're good kids, but they definitely let us know when enough is enough. Good weekend away though, I'm thankful for Andrew's weekends off, they don't come around that often these days.